Thursday, 28 May 2015

My waterbabies

by Bex

Half term means no swimming lessons so the private pool, which is hired out to swimming teachers, is available for private hire. Mum, Dad and I went on Wednesday with the twins. For the 3 of us plus babies it cost just £20 for an hour (although she said we could take as long as we needed as no one had booked after us so we had a full hour in the pool before getting out to dry and change everyone)!

I've just realised that I haven't actually managed to blog about our swimming lessons yet but I think we started them at around 12 weeks. We've now done two terms and the twins are very happy in the water and not bothered at all about being splashed or completely dunked under the water. It's great seeing them progress and actually reach for and hold the floating balls they previously ignored and they always hold on to the edge when we reach the side of the pool now too. They also close their eyes on hearing the dunking command, ready to hit the water. They've only cried once or twice the entire time we've been going and we suspect that was more down to tiredness as they've coped even if they've accidentally taken in some water and come up coughing!

We have actually booked a place at the 'official' underwater photo shoot this Sunday but I wanted to have a go myself with my little compact housing set up. I planned on waiting until after the shoot to get a better idea of what to do (since babies are quite different to the sealife I'm used to photographing!) but we wanted to take advantage of the pool while Grampy is still here (and he goes home on Monday). We just had some fun doing the usual dunking exercises we do in swimming class. I showed Mum and Dad (who watched one of the classes too) how to handle the babies safely and this enabled me to get underwater with the camera and grab some snaps. I'm not bothered about photoshopping out Mum or the edges of the pool (to be honest I'm not sure I'd be that good at it anyway) as I just wanted to record the underwater fun at this stage. I do hope to try again and get some more professional looking shots after the shoot (I think I already know how to improve them next time), as well as the proper professional ones from the shoot as well!

Anyway, here are my best snaps from our hour in the pool:

And my favourite images of my underwater babies:

I love his hilarious underwater face!

It was a brilliant way to spend an afternoon, followed by a pub lunch in the sunshine! :)